EXPLANATION TEXT

In the last decade, tsunamis have occurred all around the world. They are usually
caused by earthquakes. So how does a tectonic tsunami happen?
First, when an earthquake happens, a tectonic plate on one side of the fault
falls abruptly. It causes water to move forward with the trough of the wave at its front.
Then, as a tsunami leaves the deep water of the open ocean and travels into
the shallower water near the coast, it transforms. As the water depth decreases, the
tsunami slows. Consequently, as the tsunami’s speed diminishes, its height grows.
This is called shoaling. Because of it, a tsunami that is unnoticeable at sea may grow
to be several meters or more in height near the coast.
Tsunamis begin to lose energy as they rush onshore, but still reach the coast
with tremendous amount of energy. They can strip a large amount of sand from the
beach and take away trees. They can also cause flooding hundreds of meters inland
and crush homes and coastal structures.
An undersea earthquake in the Indian Ocean on 26 Dec. 2004 produced a
tsunami that caused one of the biggest natural disasters in modern history. It
devastated the shores of parts of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand, and other
countries and reached as far as Somalia.

Answer the questions.

1. What is the topic?
2. What causes a tectonic tsunami?
3. What is shoaling?
4. When does a tsunami lose its energy?
5. Why do tsunamis cause a great damage?
6. “It causes water to move forward with the trough of the wave at its front.”
It refers to ….
7. Consequently, as the tsunami’s speed diminishes, its height grows.”
The meaning of diminish is ….
8. The main idea of paragraph 4 is ….
9. What can we conclude from this text?
10.The text is called explanation text. What is it?
There are two kinds of this text. They are ….

An explanation text is used to describe how or why things happen.

Purpose: to tell how and why things or events work or occur.

An explanation text consists of

• Introduction: general statement, description of the topic
• Explanation: a sequence of events
• Closing: conclusion
Explanation texts often use:
 passive voice (present).
Subject + to be (is/are) + past participle (verb 3)
My series is called the Tsunami Road Show.
Many new houses are built for them.
 Sequence adverbs
first, then, consequently
 Technical terms
 tectonic, fault, shoaling

Explanation texts are categorized according to the type of process they describe.
1. Sequential Explanation text describes natural and non-natural phenomena;
life cycles

2. Cause and Effect Explanation text links cause and effect in explaining how
and why an event occurred; volcanoes.

EXERCISES
Read these 4 texts carefully. After that please:
1. Identify the texts, what kind of explanation texts they are.
2. Write the passive sentences of the texts.
3. Make 4 questions for each text.

Text 1.
How Chocolate is Made

Have we wondered how we get chocolate from? Well this time we will enter the
amazing world of chocolate so we can understand exactly we are eating.

Chocolate starts a tree called cacao tree. This tree grows in equatorial regions,
especially in place such as South America, Africa, and Indonesia. The cacao tree
produces a fruit about the size of a small pine apple. Inside the fruits are the tree’s
seeds. They are also known as coco beans.

Next, the beans are fermented for about a week, dried in the sun. After that they are
shipped to the chocolate maker. The chocolate maker starts processing by roasting
the beans to bring out the flavor. Different beans from different places have different
qualities and flavor. So they are often shorted and blended to produce a distinctive
mix.

The next process is winnowing. The roasted beans are winnowed to remove the
meat nib of the cacao bean from its shell. Then the nibs are blended. The blended
nibs are grounded to make it liquid. The liquid is called chocolate liquor. It tastes
bitter.

All seeds contain some amount of fat and cacao beans are not different. However,
cacao beans are half fat, which is why they ground nibs from liquid. It is pure bitter
chocolate

Text 2.

How A Fuel Light Works?

Many cars, motorcycles and other modern vehicles have fuel warning light devices.
the warning light is usually red which switches on automatically when the level of fuel
in the tank is very low. The warning light gives the driver information about the
amount of petrol in the tank. When the light switches on red, it tells the driver that the
petrol in the tank is almost empty. Therefore, he has to put more fuel into the tank.
However, do you know how the fuel warning works?

Well this is the way the fuel warning light works and gives the driver information
about the accurate amount of the petrol in the tank. When the level of the fuel falls,
the float inside the tank moves downwards. When this condition happens, the arm
also moves downwards and it make the lever touch an electrical contact. This
switches on the fuel light in the car dashboard.

The red light which appears in the fuel panel of the dashboard tells the driver that he
needs more petrol for his car. When he pours more petrol into the tank, this condition
makes the fuel level rise and it pushes the float upwards. In return it disconnects to
the electrical contact and makes the red light switch off.

Text 3.

How Cancer Is Formed?

What is cancer? It is actually a group of more than one hundred separate diseases.
Most of us are fear from cancer It is reasonable because next to heart disease,
cancer is the second leading cause of death.

Cancer cells come from normal cells because of mutations of DNA. Those mutations
can occur spontaneously. The mutations may be also induced by other factors such
as: nuclear and electromagnetic radiation, viruses, bacteria and fungi, parasites,
heat, chemicals in the air, water and food, mechanical cell-level injury, free radicals,
evolution, and ageing of DNA, etc. All such factors can produce mutations that may
start cancer.

Cancer cells are formed continuously in the organism. It is estimated that there are
about 10,000 cancer cells at any given time in a healthy person. Why do some
results in macroscopic-level cancers and some do not? First, not all damaged cells
can multiply and many of them die quickly. Second, those which potentially divide,
and form cancer are effectively destroyed by the mechanisms available to the
immune system. Therefore, cancer develops if the immune system is not working
properly or the number of cells produced is too great for the immune system to
eliminate.